Weekly Wine Quiz #59: Grape Trivia – Zinfandel

Traditional gnarly look of old Zinfandel vines. Picture from Wikipedia.

And the new weekend is upon us, together with the wine quiz.

We are continuing the grape trivia, and we are continuing exploring the red grapes (let me know if you think it is the time to switch to the whites). Today’s subject is Zinfandel, an American star.

Zinfandel is the black-skinned grape, known as an early ripening variety and capable of accumulating very high levels of sugar – this is one of the reasons why you can often see Zinfandel wines with alcohol by volume levels easily exceeding 15%.

Story of Zinfandel is one of the most fascinating ones compare to many other grapes you can think of – considering the amount of genetic research which went into establishing the origins of Zinfandel, the amount of attention this grape received is pretty mind boggling. After many years of back and force, it is now established that Zinfandel and Primitivo (an Italian grape from Apulia) are two individual clones of Croatian grape called Crljenak Kaštelanski. As The Drunken Cyclist, a regular winner of these quizzes, pointed out in his own quiz a while back, both Zinfandel and Primitivo are considered independent varieties and should be listed as separate varieties on the wine labels of the wines in US.

Another interesting part of the Zinfandel story is that actual powerful and seductive Zinfandel red wines as we know them now, almost became extinct at some point due to the success of sweet and insipid Pink Zinfandel wines (but please pay some respect – Pink Zinfandel still accounts for almost 10% of wine sales in US).

And now, to the quiz! As the subject is very narrow (Zinfandel is not growing all over the world), enlisting Google as your helper is totally fine (not that it was not with any of my quizzes before) – but this is up to you, of course. In any case, even if you can only answer a few questions – please do!

Q1: It was established recently that Zinfandel existed in Croatia under a different name, at least from the 15th century. Do you know what was that name?

Q2: While Zinfandel typically listed on the label, very often some other grapes are added to the blend. Name one grape which can be considered a traditional blending partner of Zinfandel

Q3: White Zinfandel was discovered by accident. Can you explain how that happen, and possibly use the proper winemaking term for the “accident”

Q4: Two California winemakers are largely credited with putting red Zinfandel wines on the wine map. Can you name them?

Q5: Most of the well known Zinfandel producers still make other wines from the different grapes. But there is one winery in California ( at least that I know of), which make nothing but Zinfandel wines. Can you name that winery?

I always go Google free, so I only have answers for two of them. Gallo and Mondavi for 4. For 3, I think it was created by a bunch of high schoolers throwing a party when their parents were away. They took some red, some white from different bottles and added red Koolaid to make it taste better. There are three winemaker terms that come to mind – cuvée, dosage, and “janitors sneaking into the winery at night and getting loaded”. (I couldn’t spell the French translation of that last one.)

OK, giving it a non-Google try too
Question 1 – I am going to steal your reference above and say – Crljenak (can I buy a vowel?) Kaštelanski.
Question 2 – Petite Sirah
Question 3 – Following on the story above and I wish that i had thought of that one, I’d say that a winery owner’s young (but of legal age) daughter was having a birthday party with a princess theme. So, pink was logical. The process, therefore, is called ‘prinessification’.
Question 4 – Ridge, Rosenblum (and/or maybe the below)
Question 5 – Ravenswood

1. Crljenak Kaštelanski
2. Petite Sirah
3. Sutter Home used to bleed off (saigné method) some juice from their fermenting red zin grapes early in the process so that the remaining red wine would be further concentrated (by a better juice to skin ratio). They would then ferment the bled off juice as a dry “White” Zin. One year, they suffered from a “stuck fermentation (the yeast died before fermenting the wine dry). They decided to sell the still sweet wine and it was a huge hit.
4. I am going with Ridge and Ravenswood
5. I will say Turley, but I know that is wrong….

1. Crljenak Kaštelanski. Say that three times fast . . .
2. Petite Sirah
3. Sutter Home made an accidental batch of sweet pink wine (as a result of a stuck fermentation) and it sold like wildfire.
4. Rosenblum and Turley (just to be different).
5. Someone who subscribes to the “do one thing and do it well” theory of winemaking . . .